162
FRÁŇA ŠRÁMEK
JENIK: You women are so strange, Lidka. A hundred times we escape from you,—a hundred times we hold forth and declare solemnly that you drain our strength like sponges . . . and a hundred times we return to endure our June-tide. The devil is in us. No, no . . . Lidka, don't get angry, don't think about it. But . . . {after a moment) it is sweet to die, though, in the glow of a heat like that. . .
LIDKA: Jenik; (a wailing note comes into her voice) I felt June to-day too. I felt it there by the window.
JENIK: You must open your breast and ask nothing of why or of wherefore . . . June will come. . .
LIDKA (suddenly): Let me be, Jenik. I feel as if I were close on stifling, and . . .
(She stands up and bursts out sobbing; then she kneels down again by the chair and lays her head on the table.)
JENIK (looking at her in surprise): Lidka. (Then nodding his head and murmuring feebly): June is here, June. . .
LIDKA (raises her head and fires Jenik with a deep glance full of tears: suddenly she springs up and embraces him violently): Jenik, Jenik, Jenik. . . now you will be so dear to me. . . Now I know . . . now I know . . . You'll love her really, won't you, now? Ah, heavens, that must be beautiful, so beautiful.
